#33, August 2011 Newstreams News, research, on-ground works, innovation and events with a focus on improving fish habitat AUSTRALIAN NEWS Tales of rivers and fish Documenting the history of our rivers is a fascinating and rewarding way of revealing how our waterways, and their fish, have changed. As part of the Murray Darling Basin Authority’s Talking Fish project, ABC Radio National broadcast a collection of stories from fishers across the Basin. Booklets documenting the oral history of twelve Murray‐Darling rivers will be released during native Fish Awareness Week in November. To listen or download: www.abc.net.au/rn/hindsight/stories/2011/3289153.htm It’s not just inland rivers that are having their history documented. Hamish Sewell collecting fishers stories for The Bhunduu ‐ The Clyde River Story has been written by students the Talking Fish project. Photo: Greg Ringwood. from Batemans Bay Public School. This Southern Rivers CMA sponsored project involved the students learning about the river’s plants and animals, Aboriginal culture and heritage and the local industries which rely upon it, then writing a book in both English and the local Aboriginal Dhurga language. For more information: www.southern.cma.nsw.gov.au/documents/25%20July%202011%20The%20Bhunduu%20- %20The%20Clyde%20River%20Story%20Book%20Launch.pdf The Hunter River is also having part of its story told. The book Maitland, City on the Hunter: Fighting floods or living with them? details the major Lower Hunter floods of the past 200 years and contains historical photos and personal tales of survival dating back to 1930. For more information: www.hcr.cma.nsw.gov.au/articles/news.asp?news_id=72 In an international example, the story of 15 years work to restore the biologically critical Fossil Creek in Arizona has been documented in film. The film examines the ecological effects of a 100‐year‐old dam and hydroelectric facility and highlights the success of this restoration for people and native species. For more information: www.mpcer.nau.edu/riverreborn/ Hat Head habitat heroes Hat Head Fishing Club has been busy planting native salt tolerant plants, including saltmarsh, to revegetate 1.2ha of the estuarine reach of Korogoro Creek. Nearly 40 club members and community volunteers, aged from 2 to 85, have been involved, including 11 fishing club juniors. Given the seniors handed responsibility for the staking and watering of their new plantings to the kids, it was almost inevitable that the final day included a water fight. The work was supported by the Club members, Kempsey Shire Council and funds from the Habitat Action Grants. For more information, email Peter Hemmings, Hat Head Fishing Club. One of the up‐and‐coming generation of fish habitat rehabilitators. Photo: Peter Hemmings. Bass Sydney busy with habitat business Bass Sydney is leading the way in getting involved in fish habitat rehabilitation. Their latest venture is a rehabilitation project at a site at Emu Plains. The club volunteers recently spent two Saturdays dealing with the copious amount of Balloon Vine that was slowly strangling the trees and shading the ground as well as dealing with lantana and privet. In the 3.5 hours each day they racked up a total 80 person hours of work. The club has regular working bees like this one. For more information: www.basssydney.com/environmental/index.php or www.facebook.com/BassSydneyFishing Fishers monitoring fish in the Namoi For the past 8 months, fishers along the Namoi River and its tributaries have been logging their fishing expeditions and recording total catch and fish size and health. Data collected so far shows apparent ‘hot spots’ along the Namoi River, particularly in the Boggabri area, where local fishers have been catching high numbers of native fish and fewer introduced species like carp. Waterways in the Boggabri area have some good remnant habitats that are being linked by rehabilitation efforts of landholders, Council, Local Aboriginal Land Councils and the Livestock Health and Pest Authorities. This monitoring program is part of the Namoi Demonstration Reach Project. For more information, contact Milly Hobson on 02 6762 1306 Improving fish habitat along the Yowaka River Areas along the tidal reach of the Yowaka River are being rehabilitated. The landowners used a Habitat Action Grant to work with Southern Rivers Catchment Management Authority, as well as neighbours and local community members, to fence 500 metres of river frontage and plant 400 native trees and shrubs. 2 000 native grasses were also densely planted along a tributary to help reduce erosion and sediment entering the Yowaka River during flooding. The project provides an important linkage with revegetation and erosion works completed downstream as well as rehabilitation works that are currently underway Everyone getting their hands dirty to improve upstream. For further information contact Shannon Brennan, Southern Yowaka River. Photo: SRCMA. Rivers CMA, on 02 6491 8200 or go to: www.southern.cma.nsw.gov.au/documents/22%20June%202011%20MR%20Improving%20fish%20habitat%20Yowaka%20River.pdf Salvinia ≠ a harmless pond plant! Salvinia is about as noxious as a water weed can get, so imagine the dismay when it was found at a local garden nursery in the Adelaide Hills, where it was being kept mistakenly as a harmless pond plant. A member of the public advised the retailer that it was a ‘declared’ plant and shouldn’t be sold. The weed is gone now from this nursery but this is the latest in a number of recent sightings of salvinia for sale in South Australia. If anyone has a plant they suspect is salvinia they should advise their nearest NRM Board office. The destruction of salvinia has to be handled carefully to prevent it spreading: throwing it into the rubbish or a green recycling bin could well result in it escaping into local waterways. Salvinia. Photo: NSW DPI. For further information about salvinia in South Australia, contact the SA MDB NRM Board on 8532 9100 or http://samdbnrm.sa.gov.au/ . For information about salvinia in general, visit: www.weeds.gov.au Yabbies on the move Did you somehow miss seeing these pictures of yabbies in Cooper Creek? www.fishingworld.com.au/news/cooper-creek-yabby-mystery Cooper Creek flows into the recently flood‐filled Lake Eyre in south‐ east Central Australia crossing the South Australian and Queensland borders. Thousands of western blue claw yabbies attempted to migrate upstream during a flow event and were held up at a road crossing. Fisheries departments and local councils continue to work on replacing such barriers with fish‐friendly – and yabby‐friendly – culverts. These yabbies can live up to 7 years, so hopefully by the next time Lake Eyre floods they’ll be able to migrate freely along Migration of yabbies being held up by a road Cooper Creek. For more information of fish‐friendly road crossings crossing. Photo: go to in NSW: www.fishingworld.com.au/news/cooper‐creek‐yabby‐ www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/fisheries/habitat/protecting-habitats/toolkit or in Qld mystery. www.dpi.qld.gov.au/documents/Fisheries_Habitats/FHMOP008-Fish-Hab- Manage.pdf Maccas breeding for success in the Goulburn‐Broken Populations of Macquarie perch in northern Victoria were significantly diminished by the 2009 bushfires but one small creek is helping them recover. Fish were removed from the badly affected waterways in the aftermath of the fires and kept for safekeeping at the Snobs Creek Hatchery. These fish have since been released back into the creeks and researchers from the Arthur Rylah Institute (ARI) are now monitoring the Macquarie perch population. They found one small area in which the fish were breeding successfully. Now this crucial location has been identified, the researchers, Goulburn‐Broken Catchment Management Authority and local Landcare groups will be working to make sure it is protected as much as possible from future sediment inputs and bank erosion. For more information: www.dse.vic.gov.au/about-dse/media-releases/threatened-species-keeps-a-fin-hold-in-the-goulburn-broken-catchment Community effort improving Numeralla River Bank stabilisation and revegetation on the Numeralla River in the Murrumbidgee catchment area will help arrest soil erosion and lead to improved water quality, river health and native fish habitat. Two sites were identified as point sources for sediment input. At one site, rock armouring was used to improve earlier erosion control works, willows were removed and the area replanted with native species. The other site benefited from the construction of ‘cribs’ and ‘pin sets’, both of which have been designed to stabilise the eroding river bank. This site was also revegetated with native plants. The Numeralla River In‐Stream Project has been a community based effort, involving Landcare, local landholders, the Murrumbidgee CMA, the Land and Property Management Authority, NSW Department of Primary Industries, Upper Murrumbidgee Waterwatch and Cooma‐Monaro Shire Council. For more information, contact Matt deJongh at the Murrumbidgee CMA on 02 6932 3232. Hardwood timber cribs were placed between the pin‐sets to protect the eroding bank and increase the deposition of suspended sediment One of the ‘pin sets’ installed to help control bank from the water column. Photo: Charlie erosion on the Numeralla River. Photo: Charlie Carruthers. Carruthers. INTERNATIONAL NEWS What happens after the dams are gone? Scuba divers are exploring and cataloguing marine life at the mouth of Washington’s Elwha River downstream of the Elwha and Glines Canyon Dams. These dams are being removed over the next three years so the survey will provide a baseline that will enable monitoring of how underwater plant and animal life react and adapt to the downstream effects of dam removal. The dive teams, in collaboration with the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe, are establishing and surveying marked transects spread throughout the Elwha River nearshore zone, as well as transect pairs at sites far from the Elwha River mouth.